


Goodbye

by sudapigrafool



Category: 30 Seconds to Mars
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-08
Updated: 2014-03-08
Packaged: 2018-01-14 23:56:13
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,852
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1283518
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sudapigrafool/pseuds/sudapigrafool
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jared has died, and Tomo is being interviewed a few weeks later.<br/>Journalism-style account of death!<br/>Tomo’s thoughts are full of his memories of Jared and the complicated inner workings of the band.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Goodbye

**"Was It A Dream?"**  
The death of Jared Leto leaves his band  
30 Seconds to Mars in an uncertain orbit

_Know_ magazine, May 31, 2006, vol. X, issue 111  
\- Chrisa Shelton, staff writer  
  
\---------

Tomo’s fingers closed, white knuckled, around his silent cell phone. "Are you sure you want to do this?" Matt had asked. Then came the lengthy pause.  
  
"Why doesn’t he call me?" Tomo responded, willfully ignoring the last few remaining moments of choice implicit in Matt’s question. "If he doesn’t want me to do the interview, why doesn’t he just tell me himself?"  
  
Matt gave a soft, weary sigh. The sound of it rushed brusquely into Tomo’s ear. "He’s still hurting, Tomo. It’s too soon."  
  
"So, he made you call." So typical.  
  
"I was worried about you, too."  
  
The sound of voices alerted him. Formal but cordial, approaching from the driveway; the time for last minute choices had expired.  
  
"I gotta go." He cut off the call before Matt had the chance to make another plea and turned a stoic, expressionless mask towards the patio doors.  
  
  
*****  
  
 _"The old music hall on Water Street in downtown Buffalo, New York has been closed ever since the fatal incident that claimed the life of actor/musician Jared Leto. Last April, in a devastating accident which took place during the city’s heavily publicized annual Buffalo Blast concert series, 30STM lead singer Jared Leto died following a miscalculated leap from a balcony. The band was performing at Under the Sphere, Buffalo’s most popular club concert venue. A recent statement from city officials concerning the conclusions of a pending investigative report suggests possible criminal charges of negligence may be filed. Through their lawyers, both club Under the Sphere’s management, now occupying the music hall, and Rock the Harbor’s concert organizers for Buffalo Blast, have tried to place responsibility for the tragedy on each other while denying a lack of oversight. However, investigators speaking to Know informally indicate there is more than enough blame to go around. That’s little consolation, however, to friends and family who survive Leto, like Tomo Milicevic and fellow 30 Seconds to Mars band members.  
  
Over the last several years, Buffalo Blast has become an increasingly lucrative five-day entertainment event, attracting thousands of tourists and tourism dollars to a city still struggling to overcome its rustbelt reputation. But recently, downtown business owners have been vocally critical of concert organizers, blaming the accompanying traffic congestion, occasional vandalism, and general disorganization on poor planning and inadequate oversight.  
  
For 30STM, the show on the night of April 8, 2006 was turning out to be one of their typically loud and energetic love fests enjoyed between the four member band and their adoring, zealous fans. Die-hard followers of the band will tell you Leto’s perilous free falls from any and every balcony railing on the concert circuit were a mainstay of 30STM performances. But that night, something went terribly wrong."_  
  
  
//They’d sent a dark-haired woman several years older than him to do the interview. She wore a pleasant expression and kept her eye contact to a minimum. At first Tomo found that a relief, until he began wondering if it was calculated. Looking her over as indirectly as possible, he couldn’t imagine she spent much time covering the music news. Although, she was dressed kinda funky for a late thirty-something, in a Conde Nast sort of way.//  
  
  
 _"The stunt was rarely planned in any conventional sense. Even so, fans were always well prepared for it from previous concert experiences, and knew what to expect. At every venue, the jump was undertaken anew like a leap of faith, with Leto dropping fearlessly into the arms of fans and waiting catchers standing in cheering throngs on the floor below. That Saturday, as Leto plummeted the nearly twenty feet from Under the Sphere’s center balcony towards dozens of eagerly outstretched arms, several fans staring up from the music hall’s tiered, concrete aisle reportedly lost their footing. In a domino effect, the falling crowd collapsed under Leto leaving him to crash headlong into the first, unyielding riser. Guard rails meant to control the crowd, and prevent concert-goers from slipping over the edge of the hall’s raised, amphitheater-like back tiers only kept onlookers from coming to his aid more quickly.  
  
Although Leto survived the trip to a local hospital, he’d suffered multiple skull fractures in the fall. He was reported unresponsive, and never regained consciousness. A few hours later, an unnamed publicist confirmed Jared Leto had died peacefully in the emergency department’s critical care unit with his brother, drummer Shannon Leto, and fellow band members by his side."  
_  
  
//They were sitting in a small suburban garden that belonged to one of Virgin Record’s public relations representatives. A long-time friend and supporter of the band, she’d offered her home as a secure, private location for the interview on the condition that her name would not be mentioned. Tomo sat quietly in the afternoon sun, lost in a sturdy Adirondack that swallowed up his present frailness between two dark, upholstered pillows. He knew he was being studied surreptitiously by this curious woman with the carefully averted gaze. There was tea, hot and spiced, steaming fragrantly from a pair of cups on the glass-topped table between them; an unexpected courtesy. Maybe this was a mistake, Tomo was thinking, trying to fight the tightness in his throat. Maybe it was still too soon.//  
  
  
 _"The frenzy of publicity in the week that followed was cruel and emotionally grueling for Leto’s surviving family and inner circle of friends. Tabloid hype surrounding the tragic nature of his death only served to ratcheted up the level of intensity. In addition to his ambitions in the field of music, Jared Leto had also maintained a modest but respectable second career as a film actor with movie credits such as "Alexander," and "Requiem for a Dream." His accomplishments in both fields swelled public interest to much more than what might have been expected based solely on the fame of his band, and his funeral rapidly turned into an unexpected mob scene when former film industry associates and colleagues assembled to pay their respects. The number of mourners swelled exponentially, accompanied by the inevitable hoards of paparazzi that tragedy and celebrity will attract. Added to that, was an astonishing turnout of loyal, distraught 30STM fans. Crowd estimates numbered in the thousands.  
  
The strain of all the public clamor may have been too much for 30STM’s band members still reeling under the stress of their private loss. On the morning of the memorial service, guitarist Tomo Milicevic arrived separately from the rest of his band mates looking particularly pale and worn. An estrangement seemed obvious, sparking speculation there may have been a falling out in the wake of Leto’s death. Shortly afterward, a brief and concisely worded press release indicated Milicevic had been hospitalized for physical and emotional exhaustion.  
  
Today, some weeks later, Tomo continues to recover in the home of a close friend, but has consented to be interviewed by Know magazine. Still looking rather pale and somewhat detached from his surroundings, he greets me distractedly. I notice he has a hard time maintaining eye contact as he smiles and shakes my hand."  
_  
  
//She set a small micro recorder on the table in front of him. Nice and old fashioned and worn with professional use. Silently, he made a bet with himself that she was the one they regularly sent out to interview the families of murder victims, or people whose houses burned down the day before Christmas. The kind of sympathetic soul an editor could count on to get everybody pouring their hearts out. If she’d ever even heard of the band at all, he mused acerbically, she’d probably had visions of guitars and space suits and ray guns.  
  
So, thinking that, her first couple questions caught him off guard.//  
  
  
 _Know: "You had just started your first headlining tour."  
  
TM: "Yeah. Well, in February, so it had been a little more than a month."  
  
Know: "And before that you had been opening for other bands like Audioslave?"  
  
TM: "Uh-huh. Audioslave, Seether, for something like eight months. Most of 2005 we were on the road."  
  
Know: "That’s a lot of mileage."  
  
TM: "Yeah. (He smiles slightly for the first time.) It sure is. More than one transmission’s worth anyway. We blew a bus transmission between, um, Vermont, I think, and Orlando, Florida. It was around, ah, late in the fall, maybe. I'm not exactly sure. You know, you’re in one place where the sun’s out and it’s hot, and the next night you’re someplace else where it’s snowing and you’re freezing your ass off. You totally lose your sense of time and place. Anyway, we were almost through by then, just had a couple more gigs to go, and there we were, stranded by the side of the road. But we made it on time, just barely, and played our set on almost no sleep. By then, I could have practically played in my sleep anyway if I’d had to, but you never want to do it like that. Jared always wanted to be completely in the moment at every performance, keeping it fresh, doing something a little different every time."  
  
Know: "Did that bus start to feel like your home away from home?"  
  
TM: "The bus? No. No, the bus was a world unto itself. A little surreal sometimes. I used to get homesick in the beginning, but later we were really like a family, you know, the four of us…"  
_  
  
//Matt was the one who’d been most sensitive to his moods at first. And he’d tried to be good and generous about it. He said he could sort of relate. Jared and Shannon, on the other hand, never got homesick, because home for them was something they saw in each other and they were never apart for long. Once, Tomo mentioned to an interviewer something about feeling homesick every now and then, it just kinda slipped out. He didn’t think anyone had really been listening to him. But after that Jared started spending more time with him, and suddenly Shannon began teasing him the way Jared liked to tease Matt. That had been interesting. And a little unnerving, never knowing when would be the next time he’d feel the jolt and libidinous creep of Shannon’s fingers grabbing at his ass. Inwardly, Tomo gave a glum, backward smile at the irony. Be careful what you wish for.//  
  
  
 _TM: "…We got very close to the point where each of us could kind of sense what the others were thinking and what they were going to do next. It was like that performing a lot. We’d be in this kind of groove together."  
_  
  
//Before he could stop it, a vivid image of Jared came welling up from some carefully suppressed recess in Tomo’s memory. The memories were all like that these days, just waiting for any instant he let down his guard. This one seemed like light years ago, a night when they’d all gone out together and were standing side by side at the bar of a club. Jared’s lithe body was swaying slowly next to Tomo’s in the near darkness. It was already around midnight and the place was packed. Shannon’s hand had been resting lightly, unselfconsciously, on the small of his back. A bluesy wail from a saxophone howled out a long, sexy riff in the background, and Jared’s gentle swaying became a focused, languorous writhe. Slowly, the press of the crowd was nudging them towards each other in the overly warm night air, but it was that other kind of heat radiating off Jared that was nearly suffocating him. Unwilling, but unable to stop himself, Tomo looked over into the electric blue eyes just inches from his own. The shock of their uncensored communication traveled the length of his spine; it did not stop until it made its way all the way down to his tips of his toes…  
  
Suddenly, his lungs were begging for air. He'd caught himself holding his breath, feeling it all again just like the first time. It was her next cool, business-like question that brought him sharply back to the present.//  
  
  
 _Know: "Your sophomore CD had come out late in August."  
  
TM: "A Beautiful Lie. It’s a great album. One of the best, most creative experiences of my life was recording that album."  
  
Know: "Were sales what you’d been expecting, or hoping for? The record had appeared on the internet a while before its official release date. A lot of people must have already downloaded it."_  
  
  
//Okay, this one was a pro, he thought, revising his original opinion of her. She'd done her homework and was taking her time with him. Letting him talk about the music and get back into the old experience again. Well, he could have made things a little easier on her by simply telling her none of it had ever left him. Not yet, no never. Not for a moment. He still carried it all with him, every day and through every dark, endless night. But going slow was helping him to talk about it, and that, after all, was what they were here for.//  
  
  
 _TM: "Of course you hope your album will be successful, and that the fans will buy the music. That’s how you get to make your next record later on. It’s a business, and it’s profit driven just like any other business. But that’s not the part you’re thinking about so much when you’re in the studio. The thing about the illegal downloading that makes it a problem is because the music industry itself is changing so much. Already has. And the record companies have been kinda slow to keep up with the technology. So now they’re losing out on the profits."  
_  
  
//Suddenly, another memory was crackling clearly and dangerously to life in Tomo's mind, something much more recent and closer to the surface. Jared had been positively nuclear when they’d first had the news about the leak. A consummate, self-described control freak, he was feeling the loss of control over his own creative product acutely. They’d all seen Jared pissed off before, but that was the first time Tomo had actually felt a little afraid of him. A deathly quiet had settled over them all as Jared sat, tight as an E-string, listening to the apologetic voice of some record company hack on his speakerphone. When the hapless caller finally rang off, Tomo had the dizzifying sensation all the oxygen had left the room.  
  
Calmly, Jared rose and went into the bedroom to get the bat. Then, even more casually, he walked out through the back door and into the garage where he began methodically smashing the windows.  
  
Horrified, Tomo watched Shannon shrink down into the couch cushions where he sat, fingers flexing and clenching uncontrollably; willing himself to stillness. On the other side of the room, Matt stood rooted like a statue, arms folded protectively over the front of his body with his chin resting heavily on his chest. They were each of them thinking the same thing, certainly, about all that flying glass. Eventually, the rage and the sounds of destruction stopped. Tomo supposed Jared must have finally run out of windows. He wondered if the Yukon had survived. And what the hell was going to happen next.  
  
But as soon as Jared was done with all that, he had a plan. Jared was never one to hang with his anger for too long, or stand in one place forever. By the end of the day, he was already in motion again.//  
  
  
 _Know: "You weren’t involved yet on the first album, is that correct?"  
  
TM: "No, I started playing with the band after that. I was in Detroit when I got a call from their manager to come to LA for an audition, and within days, literally, we were out on tour."  
  
Know: "What was that like? Were you playing catch up the whole time?"  
  
TM: "Really. No, it was a little overwhelming, but I’d been a fan. I knew the music. But still, there was definitely that feeling of being in a daze. Like walking around in a dream."_  
  
  
//Jared’s hand brushed under his collar along the back of his neck, massaging gently at the tight muscles. The crowd was already screaming in anticipation as the band before them wrapped up its set. They were going on second.  
  
"Are you ready?" Jared whispered warmly, close to Tomo’s ear.  
  
"Yeah, I think so," Tomo knew he sounded too tentative for being backstage just before a performance, and that was not what Jared wanted to hear. To Jared, every performance was an all out assault.  
  
"Just watch me," Jared smiled at him confidently. "I won’t let you fail."  
  
He gave Tomo’s neck a friendly squeeze. "And hang on tight," he grinned in an oddly relaxed way given the ferocity of the gleam in his eye. Then he stepped back. Jared always took a few moments alone before they all came together, like a strike force, striding out onto the stage. It was a ritual Tomo would learn to respect and come to know well.  
  
That night was the first time he’d felt the crazy, heady sensation that comes in the middle of playing a concert, like riding the downhill side of a roller coaster. The sound of the fans alone gave him a head rush. Hang on indeed. By the middle of "Fallen," he found himself merging mentally with the music, letting it roll over him like a huge tidal wave that carried him along with it. No, not just carrying him, his own sound was contributing, too; making the wave. He was the wave. Jared snuck a wink at him over his shoulder, and Tomo felt a sudden surge of warmth in his face and an almost ridiculous degree of happiness pumping through his veins. Afterwards, embarrassingly, adrenaline unspent, he’d gushed word vomit about everything with the same kind of giddiness teenaged girls typically displayed whenever they got too close to Jared. That is, until Shannon finally threw a towel over his head and an arm around his shoulders. He was obviously laughing at him, but agreeing it was all great. Tomo attempted to swallow his euphoria. Clearly, he needed to get a grip.  
  
But it _was_ great. For the first time since the audition, he was feeling genuinely secure with these guys. Like he really belonged.  
  
Two weeks later in the middle of an interview, Jared was asked if Tomo’s addition to the band was going to be permanent. Jared smiled at the questioner with pleasant aggression and purred smoothly, "We’ll see."//  
  
  
 _Know: "I know you had been playing with another band in Detroit. What kind of music background were you bringing with you?"  
  
TM: "If you mean training I was playing violin at age three, and guitar by the time I was twelve. My dad really encouraged me that way. We built my first guitar together, and after that it was guitar all the way. My dad used to listen to bands like Pink Floyd, and Jimi Hendrix, and was a great influence on me. And very supportive."  
_  
  
//Tomo’s dad had hated Jared. Not so much in the beginning when he didn’t really know him, but later, when he thought he did, he just despised him. He only tolerated Jared for Tomo’s sake since he wasn’t about to lose a son over it. But eventually, even that changed.  
  
When Tomo came home from LA that first Christmas, it hadn’t been an altogether happy reunion. For one thing, Tomo had used part of his time to break it off with his girl. They’d been together for, well, it seemed like forever, but the long separation had turned out to be too much for them. They’d become virtual strangers, and Tomo couldn’t even begin to find a way to explain to her what was happening with him in his new life.  
  
His father, unfortunately, had loved Tomo’s girl like she was his own daughter. Loved her maybe more than Tomo did, to be perfectly honest. Now, her place had been taken by three noisy, assertive men. Jared, who was a little hardened to these things, shrugged it off as all for the best. He’d never minded about their women; they were a necessity. But why make a permanent problem out of a situation that only required a temporary solution? That was his attitude. Afterwards, the elder Milicevic had taken a hard, dark look in Jared’s direction and decided he didn’t like anything he could see there. And probably a lot more that he couldn’t.//  
  
  
 _Know: "Jared had been quoted as saying he knew nothing about music, technically, and never wanted to. Did you ever clash over that?"  
  
TM: "Not really. He had respect for technical ability, it just wasn’t where he worked from himself, musically. Everything was more, I don’t know, internal with Jared."  
  
Know: "Was it a good fit, then? Right from the start?"  
  
TM: "Pretty good."_  
  
  
//His thoughts were getting out ahead of him. There had been a day when he was alone on the bus, and Jared came in behind him so quickly Tomo didn’t even have time to react. The shirt that had been lying on Jared’s bunk was still cradled in his grasp. Jared flung open the narrow closet door and tossed his jacket onto a hook. He was still buzzing with residual motion and energy from whatever he’d been doing last. Against the background of Tomo’s quiet, Jared loomed loud and larger than life. Tomo slipped the shirt back down on the tangled blankets again slowly, his private reverie shattered.  
  
"You can wear it if you want to," Jared offered stepping over to him. He picked up the shirt and pressed it back into Tomo’s hands. "Shan borrows it all the time."  
  
"It’s clean, or mostly," Jared continued, running his fingertips teasingly over a pale stain on the shirt Tomo was wearing. He curled his four fingers onto their nails’ edge and dragged them playfully across Tomo’s chest, grazing a tender nipple hidden under the soft fabric. Immediately, it hardened to a sensitive point and the reactive vibration echoed all the way down to Tomo’s groin.  
  
Jared slid away abruptly. "The next place we stop, we have to do laundry," he announced. Then he turned back to Tomo.  
  
"Want me to help you change?"  
  
His eyes were laughing.  
  
"No." answered Tomo tightly, only barely breathing, wavering but not moving an inch. He’d tried really hard match Jared’s mood and tone, but had obviously missed by a mile. At least.  
  
It was much, much later when they were on the road again that Tomo had finally managed to calm himself down and summon enough nerve to come back out in the open. Silently, he emerged from his bunk, and padded barefoot across the vibrating floor of the bus, heading for a seat at the table.  
  
"Isn’t that your shirt?" Shannon growled. He was stretched out on what passed for their lounge sofa with a magazine propped casually in front of him. A study in relaxed inattention. In spite of that, his voice was plainly gripped with annoyance, jabbing at his brother with its sly brand of subtle mockery.  
  
Tomo froze and glanced at Jared, wondering what, if anything he should do.  
  
"Yeah," Jared responded without looking up. "I thought he might want to wear it once before you jerk off on it."  
  
It was a joke, thought Tomo, feeling his breath clutching in his chest. A joke, right? But no one was laughing.  
  
Shannon was nothing, however, if not steely. "Good," he mumbled. "That way it’ll smell like both of you."  
  
Tomo could feel the color creeping into his face, hating that once again he was in the middle of something he couldn’t completely fathom. At that point, Matt issued a heavy, theatrical sigh.  
  
"Here. Better come over and sit by me," he intoned in that tired, worldly-wise voice of his. "Where you’ll be safe."  
  
Jared finally snickered, but Shannon didn’t make another sound.//  
  
  
 _Know: "What was it like, being in a band with two brothers?"_  
  
  
//She smiled disarmingly. Tomo tried not to hesitate visibly. He strained his face to tug up the corners of his mouth in return; as convincing an imitation of a smile as he could manage for the moment. She was asking more and more questions about Jared all the time, he was thinking, and he took a deep breath, trying to find his zen. He could feel the conversation winding down to a fine point. The really hard question would be coming soon.//  
  
  
 _TM: "Sometimes it was a little unnerving, like when they were talking in that shorthand of theirs. Or, when one of them would finish the other’s sentences like there was some kind of telepathy going on. They thought a lot alike, I think. Wanted the same things. Some reporter would ambush Jared with a question and Shannon would be right there, ready with an answer, without blinking. (He laughs unexpectedly, genuinely amused.)"  
  
Know: "Really? Because I got the impression Jared did a pretty good job of controlling the interviews. Maybe I should say monopolizing…"  
  
TM: "People would sometimes make remarks about how nobody ever got to say anything in a Thirty Seconds to Mars interview except Jared, which was a little unfair, but I guess it was kind of true in the beginning. It was mostly because Jared was the one everybody knew from his acting, he was the guy out in front, so he was the one people always wanted to talk to at first. (He’s smiling more easily now.)  
  
I remember somebody once said Jared was rude to Shannon in an interview, because Shannon had started to say something and Jared just kept talking right over him. Like he was cutting him off. What people didn’t know was how totally different it could be when it was just the four of us sitting around. (He laughs again.) I think after spending his whole life being Shannon’s little brother, and never getting a word in edgewise, that’s probably why Jared became an actor. So he’d get a turn to talk.  
  
It was a funny thing to watch. Jared would be in the middle of a thought, or a story, or something, and all Shannon had to do was like, shift in his chair, and Jared would start talking louder and faster. Like he was six years old again, and never going to get a chance to finish what he was saying. And sometimes in the middle of an interview he’d go off on these tangents. Jared, I mean. Then Shannon would make a little sound, or motion or something, just to signal him, you know? Jay, it’s time to come in for a landing."  
  
Know: "Sounds like Shannon was something of a force to be reckoned with."  
  
TM: "Yeah, but Jared was the one with the most experience dealing with the public, and most of the time he was good at it. We all got more practiced with that stuff over time."  
  
I feel the interview has been going well for both of us up until this point, but now I can’t help noticing Tomo hasn’t really responded to my last statement, about Shannon Leto, and I’m wondering if this is his gentle way of sparring with me. Letting me know where his limits are.  
  
Know: "’Stuff,’ like?"  
  
TM: "Handling ourselves in interviews."  
_  
  
//For a second, her eyes were telling him she had a sense of humor, and then, the instant before she said it, he knew what was coming.//  
  
  
 _Know: "Can you talk about that night?"  
  
TM: "No, not really. Not yet."  
  
Know: "They said there was so much screaming, so much noise and confusion, no one realized at first what had happened."  
_  
  
//He hesitated. It was true. The screaming had been deafening, but it always was at the moment when Jared let go and dropped. That night, there had been something more, a collective groan and gasp of horror just under the other sounds and ecstatic cries.//  
  
  
 _TM: "Shannon knew. He was up high enough on the drum riser he could see it all."  
_  
  
//Shannon had always seen everything.  
  
One lazy afternoon, with a certain voyeuristic fascination, Tomo had invested a few hours in watching Shannon take pictures of Jared. Black and white images that, at the time, he assumed were destined for publication. But so far, they’d never been published anywhere yet, as far as he knew.  
  
Shannon owned several expensive cameras. From the sturdy and professional to the light and unobtrusive, he was rarely without one somewhere close by. As Tomo looked on with idle interest, Shannon meticulously manipulated one with a wide, dark-eyed lens. He checked the shutter speed, mindful of the lighting, and squinted through the fine, cross-haired sight. Then, there was the sound of a muffled click. Followed by a whole rapid series of them, like muted gunfire.  
  
But, photographing Jared didn’t really seem to be a technical thing about cameras. Or lenses. It was more about the act of seeing him, of probing into his depths with the eyes.  
  
No one else ever saw Jared so completely as Shannon. The color shots he took of his brother were warm, still, and utterly direct. In black and white, Shannon rendered all of Jared’s layered contrasts raw, and laid them bare. His intimate vision missed nothing.  
  
Other photographers tried to capture Jared’s dramatic elements, or let their work refer to the obscure and hidden qualities of his nature. It was all magnificent surface, because that was all Jared would ever let them see. But Shannon saw everything.//  
  
  
 _Know: "Then what happened."  
  
TM: "Shannon ran past me. He just flew. He jumped down into the pit and was tossing bodies aside like a maniac. Girls and everybody, he didn’t even care. I don’t think he even knew what he was doing. He just wanted to get to his brother.  
  
Me and Matt jumped after him without even stopping to think. We knew it was Jared, we just didn’t know exactly what it was right then. I thought it was some assholes fighting with him. You know, he goes around wearing that damn shirt, ‘beat my fucking face in.’ I always figured someday somebody would. (He pauses.) I don’t mean he performed in it. He wasn’t wearing it that night. He was wearing white. (Tomo pauses again.) There was a lot of blood,… and all those people wearing white."  
_  
  
//It wasn’t really meant to look like lipstick. That great, gaudy red smear of paint across his face. His mouth wasn’t really meant to look like his mouth any longer either. Certainly, it had nothing to do with the act of speaking. Or, god knows, kissing. It was more like a gaping wound; an angry, black gash bleeding all over the empty space beneath his eyes, red and weeping.  
  
Before they went on, Jared would come and run his two fingers through the waxy stickiness, smearing the stain across Tomo’s lips and chin. Tomo could always sense the charge of arousal in Jared at that moment; tightly focused, amplified and projected. It was part of their ritual.  
  
This particular night, however, Jared did kiss him. He’d spread two slick, blood-colored stripes over Tomo’s mouth with his index and middle finger while standing very close, within inches of Tomo’s face. Then, light as air, Jared’s kisses followed the trail of his fingers, brushing gently over Tomo’s startled, defenseless lips. It happened so quickly Tomo almost thought he’d imagined it. He stood breathless and immobilized by his own overwhelming confusion, staring into Jared’s transfixed expression.  
  
Jared’s eyes fluttered closed for an intoxicated instant, then opened, full of his teasing smile. Tomo could see a pale, telltale shadow of red tint all around Jared’s mouth. He watched as Jared dragged his dark, paint-soiled fingertips over his own lips, deepening the color there; feeling it and tasting it. His eyes held Tomo’s in their trance-like gaze for a moment longer as he rubbed away the evidence on his white shirtsleeve.  
  
Or, almost wiped it away. A faint stain still remained, to be matched to the public declaration of his sleeve. To be compared with the red around Tomo’s mouth.  
  
Tomo’s father was backstage watching that night, seeing them in concert for the first time. Things between them had all come apart very quickly after that.//  
  
  
 _Know: "Can you talk about what you found when you got to him? Lying there on the floor of the music hall?"  
  
Tomo lowers his eyes and seems focused on the small tape recorder whirring on the table between us. For a moment, he does nothing. Then, briefly, he shakes his head, no.  
  
Know: "Alright. Up to that point, what’s your most vivid memory of the concert itself?"  
  
TM: "Probably of Jared singing, ‘Was it a Dream?’"  
_  
  
//Firmly, Jared’s lip pressed along the side of Tomo’s neck, tracking purposefully from just below his ear to the hollow of his collar bone. If not for the hand he’d thrust out into the darkness, grasping blindly for the wall, Tomo thought he just might have collapsed on his shaking knees. As Jared turned him and leaned into his back, he imagined he could feel the fierce vibration of the older man’s heart beating. Lower down, he was a lot more certain about the signs of his band mate’s barely controlled desire.  
  
He felt the heightening stir of Jared’s breathing. Tense, tremulous, more rapid than normal, the short hot puffs of his exhilaration tickled agonizingly over Tomo’s famished, receptive flesh. A sensation of vertigo seized at him, deepening the blackness surrounding them in their hidden niche. All the months of teasing, games, and heated innuendo had Tomo sliding down a very steep slope of their accumulated inertia, tumbling towards an inevitable event horizon. This time there would be no stopping Jared. He could feel the power of Jared’s gravity pulling him apart, and pulling him in.  
  
Yet, even in that opaque twilight world of their mingled passion, amidst all its subterfuge and sleight of hand, a few practicalities had still managed to intrude themselves. Such as when, exactly, Tomo wondered, and how had he lost his jeans? Which was something of a mystery. And also undeniably at issue was the resolute progress of Jared’s hands, now sliding deftly and deliberately up under Tomo’s shirt, pushing higher and higher above the pliant, muscular landscape of his back. It was the last piece of clothing Tomo was wearing and he’d found himself thinking, rather desperately, if Jared slipped it off over his head he’d be naked. Standing in the gray-black bowels of a concert arena, bracing himself against the coarse block wall of some ill-lit, unused hallway, listening to the distant shouts and urgent clamor of roadies, of sound checks, and electronic feedback, with the big bang of a whole new universe about to explode into existence all around them.  
  
Alone together, but just barely. Hidden, or almost. Nearly. Secreted away and silenced by a hungry press of lips.  
  
Naked, or… not quite.  
  
A trivial distinction, perhaps, but it was the one clear fact Tomo was clinging to in his delirium. All his lights of his more critical brain functions seemed to have winked the instant Jared’s tongue merged with the pulse point under his ear. It was like falling into a great black hole of longing where time and reason ceased to exist. Thirty seconds to nowhere, and everywhere simultaneously; like being finally and inevitably dislodged from the foundations of his world, and left reeling out of control.  
  
"I can’t," Tomo had murmured helplessly, knowing already that they would.  
  
"It’ll be better after we do, trust me," Jared whispered back, fingers grasping at his bare hips, not even hesitating for a moment in his explorations. His soft words soothed and twisted over Tomo’s objections as the hot flick of a tongue tip grazed upward along the curve of his ear. By inches, Tomo gradually turned his face into it, letting its wet trail tingle over him. Hungry and sexual. The primordial serpent, coiling itself around a heart of darkness. "It’ll be good," Jared breathed. "I promise."  
  
There was a firm, open palm stroking warmth over Tomo’s belly. Instantly, the rich sensation slid downward, settling deep in his gut, and slowly began working its way lower. For one wild moment, Tomo found himself wondering with a peculiar detachment if Matt, too, put up with this same kind of physical imposition for the sake of their creative union. He thought not, but then, his mind began conjuring pictures and... There were other acts and intimacies he felt less certain about. Because he couldn’t help having noticed the way Jared’s hands were always wandering over their bassist so liberally. He couldn't stop himself from thinking uneasy thoughts about the shy, abashed smile that altered quixotically with Matt’s cynicism. Or, avoid feeling disturbed after spending a whole day watching Matt fumble guiltily under Shannon’s unflinching stare--Shannon's gaze, invasive and penetrating even when averted. And that wasn't even mentioning every other vague, uncertain mystery that constantly swirled and eddied around them... and, well, just what fucking use, Tomo thought in despair, was a concept like ‘certainty’ anyway? Here in Letoland, birthplace of the beautiful lie?  
  
Abruptly, he jolted back to the present, his qualified detachment evaporating into unqualified reality thanks to the stealthy press of Jared’s groin rutting up against his bare behind.  
  
"So beautiful." Jared’s hands had unexpectedly changed direction, one running down over Tomo’s tailbone and stroking expertly across the twin curves of his ass. He seemed to know precisely how to find all of Tomo’s most responsive spots by instinct. Meanwhile, his other hand was brushing at the line of fine hairs that descended beneath Tomo’s navel. The familiar feel of Jared’s welcoming palm pressed against his rapidly swelling cock coaxed a raw, muffled sound from the back of his throat. They’d played at this part of the game before, however, tonight Jared wanted it all.  
  
Something clattered dully to the floor next to them. Before Tomo had time to wonder what it was, two wet fingers were probing efficiently between his butt cheeks. Jared, he realized, had come prepared.  
  
"Spread your legs," Jared ordered softly, insistently.  
  
Tomo curled his head forward until it was resting against the wall and did as he was told. He shut his eyes tightly feeling the first of those slick, demanding fingers enter him. Immediately, involuntarily, other things tightened too.  
  
"Don’t do that. You’ll make me hurt you. Just relax," Jared warned quietly, carefully adding a second finger and gently pushing the pair of them in and out. His other hand was covering the length of Tomo’s cock, rubbing rhythmically and keeping track of the state of his arousal, trying to excite and distract Tomo from the unfamiliar intrusion going on in his rear end.  
  
Tomo felt the firm tunnel of Jared’s fingers close around him in a fist. His hips jerked forward once and then froze as his ass clenched painfully. "Jared…" he gasped.  
  
I can’t, we can’t. Not here, not now, please.  
  
"Sh-h-h-h." The sound huffed passed his ear on an impatient gust of exhaled breath while the insistent jerking of Jared’s hand on his cock continued. Now he was using his thumb to circle and caress the sensitive tip, teasing and probing delicately until it pulsed and oozed with pre-come. In no time, the warm slick had worked its way under the pull of Jared’s fingers, making them slippery and wet. Tomo’s hips stuttered again, caught between the spiking hurt in his ass and the escalating ache of his need. He squirmed and whined in frustration. Fucking fuck, he was hard, but none of this was accomplishing quite what Jared had hoped for. Although Tomo had began thrusting eagerly into his hand, the spasming resistance around Jared’s other fingers had only gotten worse.  
  
"Slide down," Jared mumbled, suddenly withdrawing both his hands. Instantly, Tomo’s senses were reeling with a combination of relief and agonized deprivation. Behind him, Jared dropped to his knees and grabbed Tomo around the waist, pulling him down into a squat just above him. He leaned into him, forcing Tomo’s thighs wide and grinding his knees into the wall in front of them. "This’ll help you stay open. Now relax."  
  
Crushed up behind him, Tomo could feel Jared urgently rubbing his artfully lubricated self all over the verge of Tomo’s sore, agitated entrance. The gritty surface of cinder block was biting into the palms of his hands.  
  
What he felt next was not the patient probing of Jared’s fingers. There was a momentary burning sensation that accompanied the strain of accommodating Jared’s bulk, followed by Jared gently rocking into him, cooing soothingly at first while wrapping his arms around Tomo tightly and possessively. Soon the anguished pumping of Jared’s dick filling him was the only sensation in Tomo’s world. Two balmy, grasping palms stroked firmly down his sweat-dampened chest. A ring of skillful fingers closed around Tomo’s cock again, squeezing up and down snugly over its taut reddened tip, one by one. With hardly any room to maneuver, Tomo found himself struggling to thrust and pull back in an increasingly needy counterpoint to Jared’s gentle tugging. He was starting to feel a shaking fatigue in his thighs, but their mounting sense of urgency gave him no chance of a respite. When Tomo moaned softly, Jared made a warning sound to shush him, but by now Jared’s own breath was gasping out of him in a harsh, guttural pant.  
  
Tense, shivering, and on the edge, Tomo arched back into Jared’s thrusts. The side of his face scraped rhythmically against the cold, block wall in time with their coupling. Beneath them, Jared’s knees ground painfully into the hard tile floor. Feeling like every one of his nerve endings was on alert, he could sense the simmering conflict barely contained under Tomo’s intense, erotic burn. Fumbling with his free hand, lost in the nearly blinding darkness, Jared reached forward and found Tomo’s fingers digging desperately into the rough surface of the wall supporting him. Wordlessly, he laced his own fingers between his band mate’s until they were gripped together securely and inseparably intertwined. Within moments, Jared felt the strained clenching around his cock rapidly become uncontrollable. He heard Tomo’s choked, "huh!…huh!" and groan, and felt the erratic jerking of his hips begin to take over. Smothered deep inside Tomo’s tightness and heat, Jared’s orgasm erupted out of him in one long, relieved and feverish rush. Somewhat distantly, he felt the simultaneous throb and pulse of Tomo coming, pumping wetly and messily over his slim, gifted hand.  
  
Just before they stepped out onto the stage together, Tomo tucked and straightened his clothes with trembling fingers one last time. Next to him, Matt leaned in close to his ear.  
  
"Now do you understand?"  
  
Tomo nodded numbly, looking up at him across the space of a universe turned inside out, and thought to himself, more honestly, that he would probably never understand anything. Ever again.//  
  
  
 _Know: "Have you thought about what you’re going to do now?"  
  
TM: "Yeah, I’ve thought about it. Then, there are days when I can hardly think at all. Go home, I guess. See my family. I haven’t thought about anything after that."  
  
Know: "What about the other band members? Have you spoken to them?"  
  
TM: "I talked to Matt on the phone today. He called earlier."  
  
Know: "What about Shannon?"  
  
After hesitating for a second, Tomo almost imperceptibly shakes his head.  
_  
  
//It would be hard enough, facing his father. That he had to do, they were family. Somehow they would mend it. With Shannon, Tomo had come to understand he had transgressed something deeper than family. What, exactly, was too complex to say for certain, but the thought of facing Shannon right now was untenable.//  
  
  
 _Know: "Before the tour Jared said the band was already working on new songs. Did you ever perform any of them?"  
  
TM: "No. It was just some fooling around in ProTools. And some ideas Jared jotted down."  
  
Know: "Any chance they will ever be finished?"  
  
TM: "I don’t see how."  
  
Know: "You had other recordings. Songs that never made it onto ‘A Beautiful Lie.’"  
  
TM: "Yes."  
_  
  
//His head was beginning to throb. He blinked, and his eyes burned under the thin, red veil of their lids.//  
  
  
 _Know: "Any chance they will ever be released?"  
  
TM: "I don’t know…"  
_  
  
//Just the thought of it went through him like a knife.//  
  
  
 _TM: "…all that belongs to Shannon now, technically. You’d have to talk to him."  
_  
  
//Shannon was the one Tomo had met first and known the longest, and as things turned out, understood the least. His hands were the ones Tomo had first become familiar with; resting quietly on his arm, thrown casually around his shoulders, groping his ass playfully in front of total strangers.  
  
Shannon’s hands had the kind of hard-driven strength that kept a man’s feet on the ground. They were fit for almost any sort of work that came his way, and in them, steady and secure, he held the rhythm of all their lives, palms open. Once, in a moment of loneliness and uncertainty, Tomo had found comfort there. But, the aftermath of that had only brought complexity and change.  
  
Now, in his mind’s eye, Tomo saw Jared once more, eyes lazy-soft and sated, his arm arced above his head on the pillow. And on his out-turned wrist, at the most tender and vulnerable spot just over his pulse point, was the glyph. LETO and LETO Their names two times, entwined, like yin and yang.  
  
Perhaps there had never really been a way for Tomo to enter into that sacred harmony. But he had tried.//  
  
  
 _Tomo had told me as much as he could, as much as he knew up to that moment, and had exhausted himself again. I could see that. I thanked him for his forthrightness and his time, and stood to go. As I did, he rose with me.  
  
TM: "I wish there was something else I could say, that you could print, that would make this easier for all the people who ever cared about Jared. ‘Cause there are a lot of them."  
  
Know: "Like what?"  
  
TM: "Well, you know, like how he was living his dream, but that sounds so corny."  
  
Know: "Was it true?"  
  
TM: "It was very true. He had what he wanted."  
  
Know: "I’ll tell them that."  
_  
  
//Tomo watched her back a very functional Subaru out of the long driveway and disappear behind the hedgerows. He thought about calling Matt to assure him everything had gone okay. What that really meant was he wanted to pass along a message to Shannon that he could stop worrying. All the beautiful lies were safe and still intact. As well as one very elusive truth.//

\--- end ---


End file.
